A/N: I'm so sorry for the late update. This is the second-part of this two-shot. I have no clue why I didn't write and post this last year, but I guess I'm still a little bit around. Thanks for all the feedback on my other two stories, guys. It means a lot to me. I'd like to continue writing, I think, if a good story comes to mind.
Naruto has never lost the sunny optimism of his genin years; his demeanor is as bright as his old orange jumpsuit.
The first time they spar together, really spar, not just doing practice stances, is after both their prosthetic arms are fully functional. They limit themselves to taijutsu, mostly, and the rasengan and chidori are both forbidden—they are not, after all, techniques meant to be used on teammates.
But Naruto being the Number One Hyperactive, Knucklehead Ninja and Sasuke having Uchiha fire running through his veins, the battle quickly becomes more intense than they first intended. Sasuke finds himself shooting out fireball after fireball in order to stop the onslaught of shadow clones coming at him in droves, but it seems that for each one he takes out, ten more take its place.
Is this idiot planning to pummel me to death? he wonders. He starts to feel claustrophobic, hordes of clones closing in from every direction. There must be thousands of them. He knows he is quick as ever, but the sheer numbers are overwhelming. And because Uchiha Sasuke, always second-best of the family, hates losing on principle, his bloodline limit activates without him really willing it to.
It's not malice or desire for revenge that sends a crackle of lightning running up his forearm, just instinct. But the sound of chirping birds makes Naruto stop all the same, eyes wide in shock, and he stands there dumbly. Sasuke wants to shout at him to get out of the damn way, but there's no time, and words refuse to leave his mouth anyway. Even with Naruto's fox agility, Sasuke's attack is already in motion, and the Uchiha has always been the faster of the two. His Sharingan is locked on the true target, and in his heart Sasuke knows he will not miss.
He plunges his arm deep into Naruto's torso, electricity crackling around the hole it forms, and every shadow clone disappears with a poof.
The effect is immediate and fatal. The light is already leaving those bright blue eyes, and even as he bleeds out on the training ground grass, Naruto fixes that same shocked expression on his best friend and brother.
"Sasuke … how could you? After everything, you still wish for my death?"
And as Sasuke watches the scene, it's like he's seeing it from the third person, watching some other black-haired boy clutching a still-warm body as Naruto's soul slips away. He can barely process what is happening.
"You betrayed us," the jinchuuriki says in a darker tone than Sasuke has ever heard. It's accusatory and unforgiving, exactly what Sasuke knows he deserves, but what the living Naruto would never tell him. "You destroyed the village. Your brother deserved better than a traitor like you. I deserved better than a friend like you." The boy glares at him, just briefly, before closing his eyes, unable to sustain himself any longer.
It is then that Sasuke finally finds his voice.
"Naruto!" he yells, his arm still embedded in the body, holding it upright. "Don't die on me! Naruto!" His voice breaks into a sob, because this is the kind of damage Sakura could not heal even if she were right there when it happened. He crashes to his knees, clutches his best friend closer as the world fades before his eyes.
To be a blind Uchiha is akin to rejecting the family. Every Sharingan user has near-perfect visual acuity when the bloodline limit is activated, allowing for the best possible perception of jutsus and other threats. But with each tear Sasuke spills, his vision darkens further until the only thing he can see is black. He can feel the soft dirt beneath his knees, but he cannot see it.
They started in broad daylight, and now it is as though the sun itself has been snuffed out.
A fitting punishment for my sins, Sasuke reasons. The unwavering warmth of the sun did not belong to brother-killers, after all.
When he awakes on the very same training ground, a very concerned pair of green eyes blinks at him.
"He's up, Naruto!" Sakura shouts.
Naruto?
The blonde boy bounds over, almost puppylike in his excitement.
"Sasuke, you're awake! You were out for, like, half an hour! I had to get Sakura-chan from the hospital because you were screaming and everything. I didn't think I punched you that hard, but I think you blacked out or started hallucinating or—"
The jinchuuriki could have chattered on forever, but he's interrupted when Sasuke grabs his hand and pulls himself to his feet. Naruto, seizing the opportunity, pulls him back to the ground and piles on top of him, wrapping the Uchiha into a satisfied bear hug. Sasuke, wonder of wonders, lets him do so without grumbling, and Sakura, observing the curious situation, flops onto the ground next to both of her boys and joins the group hug.
"You're here," Sasuke says, so low that the other two almost miss it. He takes deep, calming breaths, his heart still pounding so heavy that he can hear the blood rushing in his ears. He hasn't felt this relieved in a long time.
"Of course we're here, dumbass!" Naruto whoops. "Where else could we possibly go?"
The rest of the day, Sasuke is surprisingly pleasant to be around, and neither Naruto nor Sakura can say they're upset by the change. When Naruto asks for them to get ramen for dinner as a team, and Sakura proposes a movie and a sleepover afterward, he doesn't even make them beg before agreeing.
Naruto and Sakura cast suspicious looks at each other, then shrug and smile. They'll take every day of a non-temperamental Uchiha they can get.
When they've had their fill at Ichiraku's, Teuchi thanks them for being his best customers as always, and they head to Sakura's apartment to spend the night. (Naruto's is too filthy, and the Uchiha complex is too grim.) Sakura has chosen some stupid comedy adventure to watch, and Sasuke knows he will not pay attention to a second of the low-brow entertainment that the other two love.
Still, he settles in the middle, flanked by Sakura (who he feels has been far too affectionate today) to his left, and on his right Naruto (who is somehow even more needy). Despite liking physical contact the least, Sasuke is always in the middle. He suspects the long years apart have made them cautious, so they've put him in the center so both of them can pin him down if he tries to leave. But right now he has no plans to leave Sakura's couch, let alone Konoha.
Settling under the blankets, Sakura scoots a bit closer to the Uchiha boy and gives him an overly forward kiss on the cheek for being so agreeable all day. This displeases him just enough to make him want another.
On his other side, Naruto goes in for a kiss on the cheek as well, and Sasuke, seeing the movement out of the corner of his eye, lifts his head to avoid the bad-breathed jinchuuriki. But his timing is bad.
"What the hell, dobe! You bit my chin!" Sasuke yells.
"YOU CHINNED MY TEETH!" Naruto shrieks back, his voice loud and shrill enough to make Sakura cover her ears.
But then he falls into a fit of giggles, unable to hold back at the sight of tooth marks on Sasuke's chin. Sasuke glares at him and cups his hurt chin tenderly, which looks so ridiculous it sends Sakura bursting into peals of laughter. The two laugh for ages at Sasuke's indignant face, completely missing every important scene in the movie, until Sasuke has to crack a smile at their antics.
The sight of Sasuke's upturned lips is so novel to Naruto and Sakura that it makes them stop laughing and stare at him for a moment. He can tell Sakura is burning the image into her memory to save for later, but Naruto is just glad to have him around.
"I love you, Sasuke," they say almost simultaneously.
The word love has real meaning to Sasuke now, a meaning he spent his entire adolescence trying to forget. For a second, his thoughts are transported back home, his real home, where Uchiha Itachi is tickling him on a lazy Sunday morning until 5-year-old Sasuke begs him to stop. Fugaku gruffly tells the boys to get out of their parents' bed, and Mikoto, barely awake, asks them to wash up before breakfast.
This memory hurts to swallow and certainly too much to share, so instead of saying what he really means, all Sasuke says is, "I know," and smirks. His team will understand.
The moon is only the moon because of the pull of the earth and the reflected light of the sun, he realizes. All three of them need each other to survive, but perhaps him most of all. Uncharacteristically, he tosses his prosthetic arm over Naruto's shoulder, and Sakura wraps herself around his other side. There, they find some balance.
